Follow-ups to Symposium on the Role of the Arts in Public Diplomacy

CCA Bul­letin 06/08

Feb­ru­ary 29, 2008

 

 

 

Just the Facts

 

The CCA is releas­ing the sum­mary of pro­ceed­ings from the Sym­po­sium on the Role of the Arts in Pub­lic Diplo­macy that was held on Novem­ber 22, 2007 in Mon­treal. The back­ground paper pre­pared by Rachael Maxwell has also been posted on the CCA web­site and the record­ing of the Sym­po­sium pro­ceed­ings is avail­able upon request.

Fol­low­ing the Sym­po­sium, the CCA has gath­ered Cana­dian and for­eign cul­tural diplo­macy experts to form a Steer­ing Com­mit­tee on the inter­na­tion­al­iza­tion of Cana­dian artists, cre­ators and arts pro­fes­sion­als. The Com­mit­tee met recently to con­sider the next steps that the CCA should take on this issue.

The Board of Gov­er­nors has already expressed its deter­mi­na­tion to per­se­vere on this issue in a rig­or­ous and con­struc­tive man­ner. The Steer­ing Com­mit­tee will be pre­sent­ing a num­ber of activ­i­ties and research projects to enable the arts and cul­ture sec­tor to pro­vide a bet­ter frame­work to the debate on the inclu­sion of the arts in any pub­lic diplo­macy ini­tia­tive by the fed­eral gov­ern­ment. The CCA Board will be con­sid­er­ing an action plan to move this issue for­ward when it meets in March 2008.

 

Tell Me More

 

The Steer­ing Com­mit­tee* sees the release of the sum­mary of pro­ceed­ings and the back­ground paper as a frame­work for fur­ther dis­cus­sion and research on the role of the arts in pub­lic diplomacy.

The Steer­ing Com­mit­tee has iden­ti­fied sev­eral key issues that must be addressed in order to elab­o­rate a long-term strat­egy. They include:

• Why should Canada encour­age pub­lic diplo­macy in the cur­rent inter­na­tional environment?

• Why should the arts be part of a national pub­lic diplo­macy effort?

• Which deliv­ery mod­els are the most effec­tive in attain­ing our national pub­lic diplo­macy goals? What can we learn from the expe­ri­ences of other countries?

• How can we best rec­on­cile for­eign pol­icy objec­tives with cul­tural objectives?

• What is the best way to achieve coher­ence among the var­i­ous fed­eral fund­ing pro­grams that sup­port inter­na­tional activ­i­ties by Cana­dian artists, cre­ators and arts professionals?

• Some provin­cial gov­ern­ments also have devel­oped pro­grams to pro­mote the arts as part of their inter­na­tional out­reach. An inven­tory of these pro­grams is underway.

The CCA will con­tinue to pur­sue the sug­ges­tions put for­ward by the Steer­ing Com­mit­tee and work with fed­eral offi­cials and their provin­cial col­leagues to advance our col­lec­tive under­stand­ing of the com­plex rela­tion­ships behind cur­rent Cana­dian efforts in this area.

* Mem­bers of the Steer­ing Com­mit­tee are:

Robert Spick­ler, Pres­i­dent of the CCA

Joyce Zemans, Pro­fes­sor at York University

Michael Brock, Retired Diplomat

Jean Fre­dette, Retired Cul­tural Attaché

Mar­tin Rose, Direc­tor Canada of the British Coun­cil and Cul­tural Attaché to the British High Commission

Aimee Full­man, Project Advi­sor and Con­sul­tant, USA

 

What Can I Do?

 

The CCA and the mem­bers of the Steer­ing Com­mit­tee would wel­come any input on any provin­cial pro­grams that sup­port artists, cre­ators and arts pro­fes­sion­als in their inter­na­tional outreach.

Any doc­u­men­ta­tion or eval­u­a­tions of these or any inter­na­tional pro­grams in Canada or abroad would also be most help­ful as we develop our research activ­i­ties in this domain.Please send such mate­r­ial to Guil­laume Sirois, Cul­tural Pol­icy Advi­sor guillaume.sirois@ccarts.ca . Your help is most appreciated.